How do plants make food? How do animals sleep
through winter? How do seasons change? Find out
the answers to these questions and more as That’s
how things happen takes you to nature’s laboratory
and brings alive the magic of nature and its processes.
Other titles in the series:
That’s
That’s
That’s
That’s
That’s
how
how
how
how
how
things work: the marvel of modern technology
things began: the inventions that changed our world
mysterious events occur: the mind-boggling natural phenomena
things travel: the wonderful ways in which the world moves
strange creatures live: the amazing life of bizarre animals
ISBN 978-81-7993-546-0
9 788179 935460
` 185
The Energy and Resources Institute
This book is printed on recycled paper
the magical mysteries of nature
A note from Dr R K Pachauri
uman society has reached a stage of prosperity, which was not
expected several decades ago. Yet, we have a large number of
people living in poverty and barely able to keep alive. It appears
that they have not been touched by human progress at all. At the
same time, what we regard as progress has resulted in damage and
destruction of our natural resources and caused serious problems
such as human-induced climate change, which threatens all forms
of life in the form of sea-level rise, heatwaves, floods, droughts, and
melting of glaciers in different parts of the world.
H
All of this provides a strong reason for us to change the way we
have been pursuing human activities and what we have mistakenly
believed as human progress. For instance, we must now use
renewable sources of energy, eco-friendly methods of production
and consumption, make efficient use of water in every activity, and
protect biodiversity.
It is in the hands of the children to try to change their own lives towards
greater protection of the environment and all our natural resources.
They can also take active part in changing the thinking of adults.
Children can take a lead in organizing actions at the community
level, which support conservation of resources, recycling of waste
water, and greater use of renewable sources of energy.
This series of children’s books is aimed of providing children
knowledge on what needs to be done in all these areas. I hope those
who read these books will not only enjoy them greatly but also feel
inspired to implement actions that are described in these pages,
so that we create a beautiful, peaceful, and healthy future for the
human race.
R K Pachauri
Director-General, TERI
Chairman, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
The Energy and Resources Institute
An imprint of The Energy and Resources Institute
© The Energy and Resources Institute, 2014
Published by
TERI Press
The Energy and Resources Institute
Darbari Seth Block, IHC Complex, Lodhi Road, New Delhi - 110 003,
India
Tel. 2468 2100/4150 4900, Fax: 2468 2144/2468 2145
India +91 Delhi (0)11
Email: [email protected] Website: http://bookstore.teriin.org
ISBN 978-81-7993-546-0
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any
form or by any means without the prior permission of The Energy and
Resources Institute.
Author: Arshi Ahmad
hry
Publishing Head: Anupama Jau
Ekta Sharma,
ms:
Tea
tion
duc
Pro
Editorial and
an Sachdeva,
Himanshi Sharma, Pallavi Sah, Am
Mahfooz Alam
Priyabrata Roy
Design and Illustration Teams:
y Kumar;
Chowdhury, Rajiv Sharma, and Vija
Neeraj Riddlan
Printed and bound in India
This book is printed on recycled paper.
Contents
How do plants make food?
6
How do plants store food?
8
How do plants breathe?
10
How do plants drink water?
12
How do plants protect themselves?
14
How do plants disperse their seeds?
16
How do plants reproduce?
18
How do fish breathe in water?
20
How does a caterpillar turn into a butterfly?
22
How do living creatures depend on each other? 24
How do animals protect themselves
from enemies?
26
How do animals live in very hot
and cold places?
28
How do animals sleep the winter away?
30
How do birds fly distances?
32
How are baby animals born?
34
How does day turn into night?
36
How do the seasons change?
38
How is lightning formed?
40
How does water go around in a cycle?
42
Fun with clues
44
Index
46
How do plants make food?
What do you do when you feel hungry? You head to the kitchen
and look for something to eat. Have you ever wondered whether
plants also feel hungry? What do they eat? Who cooks for them?
Well, plants do not “eat” like we do, but they prepare their
own food.
Recipe for plant food
Plants use light energy from the Sun to prepare their food. They do this by
a process called photosynthesis. Photosynthesis takes place in the leaves of
green plants. So, the leaf is a plant’s kitchen!
All living things are made up of very small blocks called cells. The cells of
leaves have chloroplasts. These contain a magic ingredient called chlorophyll,
which gives green colour to the leaves. Without chlorophyll, there would be
no photosynthesis and no food!
A plant that eats
Some plants do eat, after
all. The Venus flytrap is a
plant that eats insects. It
has nectar, a sweet liquid, to
attract insects. Fine hairs on
the edges of its leaves form a
jaw-like trap. As soon as an
insect enters the
jaws of the flytrap, the
trap closes.
6-7
“Cooking” plant food
Besides sunlight and chlorophyll, two
more ingredients are needed for
photosynthesis – carbon dioxide
and water. Leaves have tiny
openings, or pores, called
stomata on their surfaces.
Carbon dioxide from
the air enters the leaves
through these pores.
Water trapped in the
soil travels to the leaves
through the roots.
Chlorophyll traps energy
from the Sun. Using this
energy, carbon dioxide
and water combine to make
glucose. Glucose is a kind
of sugar. It is also plant food!
THAT’S HOW THING
S HAPPEN
carbon
dioxide +
water
=
sugar + oxygen
Plenty of food,
and oxygen too!
All of us, humans and
animals, depend on the
food made by plants.
Plants also give out
oxygen into the air during
photosynthesis. We
all use this oxygen for
breathing. Now you know
why green plants are so
important to us!
We can’t cook!
Not all plants can
make food. Fungi are
a group of non-green
plants like mushrooms
and moulds. They do
not have chlorophyll
and cannot make food.
They absorb food from
other living plants.
Some get their food by
breaking down dead
animals and plants.
Chlorophyll
Breathing
easy!
Plants use chlorophyll in their
leaves to trap sunlight, and
together with carbon dioxide
and water from their roots,
they make sugar and oxygen.
How do plants store food?
Green plants are our “food factories”. They make more food than they
use. They need “warehouses” to store the ex tra food. They store it in
their roots, stems, leaves, and fruits. You will be surprised at the odd
shapes that plant parts adopt to store food!
Going underground!
Stems hold plants erect. They
enable water to travel from
the roots to the leaves, and the
prepared food from the leaves to
all parts of the plant. Some stems
grow underground to store food.
Such swollen stems are also called
tubers. Potatoes are examples
of such stems. The “eyes” on a
potato are buds, which can grow
into new plants. Ginger, gladiolus,
and crocus are also underground
stems that store food.
Swollen
stems?
A radish is a root!
Roots absorb water and support a plant.
Sometimes, they change their shape to
store food. Radish, carrot, turnip, beetroot,
and sweet potato are actually roots! They
are all swollen up to store food.You can
also see fine root hairs on these vegetables.
8-9
THAT’S HOW THING
S HAPPEN
Leaves that turn
into bulbs
Photosynthesis and exchange of
gases occur in leaves. They also
store food and water. Bulbs, like
onions, are modified underground
leaves that store food. What we eat
are fleshy scale leaves arranged one
above the other in rings. The stem is
reduced to a flat disc at the bottom
of the bulb. Garlic and lily are also
underground bulbs.
Not a root,
you said?
That’s root!
The tree
of life
Sweet fruits
A fruit develops from a flower. It
contains plant seeds, which grow
into new plants. Tomato, peach,
orange, apple, and mango are fleshy
because of all the food they store.
Some fruits may also be dry like
peanut and oak acorn. Broccoli
and cauliflower are flowers.
The baobab tree, commonly
found in Africa, is also called
the „tree of life‰. People live in
the hollows of its huge trunk.
They eat not only the fruit
(called monkey
bread) but also
the leaves,
seeds and
roots. The trunk
stores hundreds of litres of
water, which the tree uses
during the hot summer.
How do plants breathe?
Living things may be of different kinds, but they all have some things in
common. One of them is that they all breathe. When we breathe, we take in
ox ygen and give out carbon dioxide. Plants also breathe in a similar manner.
Do plants have lungs?
Plants generally breathe through the stomata located on the leaves.
An average leaf has about three hundred stomata in every square
millimetre. That’s a lot of stomata in a tiny speck of area! The
Spanish oak tree has the largest number of stomata – about 1,200
per square millimetre. Trees not only breathe through the stomata,
but through pores on their trunks and branches
as well. These pores are called lenticels.
Glucose...
my
energy
drink!
How do plants get energy?
Plants prepare food (glucose) with
the help of sunlight. Plants breathe
in oxygen, which helps break glucose
into carbon dioxide and water. In the
process, energy is released. This process
is called respiration.
Stomata
Do plants respire all the time?
Yes, plants respire all the time, while photosynthesis
occurs only during the day. Respiration is the opposite
of photosynthesis because when plants breathe, carbon
dioxide is taken in and oxygen is given out.
glucose + oxygen
10-11
carbon dioxide +water + energy
How come? How so? That's how things
happen: the magical mysteries of
nature
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ISBN : 9788179935460
Author : Arshi Ahmad
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